‘Sanral summonses won’t stand up in court’

155 The N12 gantry at The Glen towards Alberton. Sanral e-toll 051114. Picture: Bongiwe Mchunu

155 The N12 gantry at The Glen towards Alberton. Sanral e-toll 051114. Picture: Bongiwe Mchunu

Published Jun 15, 2016

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Johannesburg - The Organisation Against Tax Abuse has formed its own dedicated legal team, and is gearing up to defend its members against Sanral summonses for outstanding e-tolls.

It has already served the South African National Roads Agency Limited with notices of its intention to defend 112 of its members, who were among those peppered by the agency's shotgun blast of 6500 summonses.

Also read: E-toll cases to 'clog' SA courts

In those notices the team has questioned the 'poor content and questionable information' the lack of necessary detail and 'incorrect references to the laws and regulations related to the alleged transgressions' contained in the summoses.

"We believe Sanral will find it almost impossible to justify these charges," said Outa legal director Ivan Herselman. "It's likely the agency will have to pull the plug and recall all 6500 summonses."

Not only was the wording of the summonses questionable at best, he said, but the inaccuracy of the names, addresses and contact details in both the national vehicle licensing and e-toll systems had resulted in many summonses never even reaching the road-user.

"We've had lots of call from motorists who've received text messages informing them of a court case number against them, but who never received the summons."

Adminstrative bungles

Outa chairman Wayne Duvenage also pointed out that in at least one case he knew about, Sanral had issued summons to a motorist who had taken up the recent discount offer, and could prove that he had settled his outstanding e-toll debt in full.

"We see administrative bungles and system problems to do with the e-toll scheme every day," Duvenage said.

"These show that the system is basically unworkable - it's time for sanity to prevail and for government to cancel the e-toll scheme once and for all."

Motoring.co.za

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